Stan Winston, Effects Wizard and Creature Creation Genius, dead at 62

Stan Winston was a true wizard of special effects. On all levels of make-up, creature creation, and visual effects this guy was amazing. Without him movies such as Aliens, Batman Returns, Juraissic Park, Terminator 2, and many more wouldn’t have been even half as incredible. This was a man of true talent and who possessed a fertile imagination, something that Hollywood and movie fans will be really missing now that he has passed. The last movie I saw that benefited from Stan Winstons’ talents was Iron Man. His effects studio built the suits of armor used in the film.

His traditional effects and creations kept up and blended well with the computer generated effect used in modern film-making. The look of the CG Iron Man armor and the actual suit are seamless in the film. I’ve always been a big fan of the Winston Studios creation, and I hope they continue on for a long time carrying on the tradition of quality effects and imaginative creature creation set by Stan.

Stan Winston Studio Website

Iron Man Dominates & More Hulk Photos

For the second week in a row, Iron Man stood defiant on the top of the box office sales figures. The flick raked in an additional $50.5 million domestically, for an accumulative domestic gross of approx $177 million so far. Speed Racer didn’t fare to well on its opening weekend, suffering from negative buzz online and less than favorable reviews it only brought in $20.2 million narrowly locking in a 2nd place position box office sales.

I don’t think the studio plugged Speed Racer hard enough as a kids movie, with a better marketing effort Speed Racer could have done a little better in sales. But honestly, there was only so much they could do to counter all the positive chatter that has surrounded Iron Man. Even though a feature length Speed Racer film doesn’t interest me in the least, the effects and atmosphere look awesome. It looks like it’ll make a good DVD to pop into an HD set up.

More Hulk images were released, Cinematical has them available to view : http://www.cinematical.com/photos/the-incredible-hulk-1/ A few look like stills from the trailers that have been released, which is fine. Since Iron Man was so well executed, I have some new hope for the Hulk as a movie. As a shareholder, I have some concern about its performance. A lot of fans didn’t like the previous Hulk flick, and since that didn’t come out too long ago it might negatively impact sales for this movie at the box office.

Film Review: Iron Man

Kudos to Marvel and Jon Favreau, you did it. Iron Man is the best Marvel superhero movie to date, bar none. It might actually be one of my favorite films of the genre, period. This was an intelligent movie with humor and heart that didn’t rely on special effects to carry the film. This film is more about the growth of the man behind the armor then really the superhero adventures of Iron Man.

I was in the camp that thought this movie would suffer from Origin Syndrome where we have to through the paces of seeing the Iron Man become Iron Man. Honestly I really liked this element of the film. Iron Man’s origin is one that has been retold ad naseum. I could recount the origin of Superman or Spider-Man in my sleep. Tony Stark figuring out how to create the Iron Man armor in all its incarnations was a cool process to be a part of. It gave the audience a chance to see why he’s a different kind of hero than any we’ve seen onscreen. This wasn’t a kid who got his powers by accident. In Tony Stark we have a middle-aged man building a suit of armor in order to save his life, both literally and figuratively.

To echo everyone else’s praise, Robert Downey Jr. was perfect as the lead character. But a lot of credit also has to go to this screenplay, also to director Jon Favreau for putting together a great cast. Terrence Howard as Jim “Rhodey” Rhodes and Gwyneth Paltrow as Pepper Potts were both excellent. These are both key characters in the Iron Man stories, they were brought to the screen with the same level of excellence that Downey provided his portrayal of Tony Stark.

I’d heard some complaints that the end battle was a weakness for the film. I have to disagree. Though it was a predictable as an oncoming train. I didn’t feel that the scene dragged on for too long, nor do I think the film was using this battle sequence as a special effects laden crutch. It was a well done film that got me excited for future installments. I hope they are able to keep the cast together from this first film.

I give it a 4 out of 5 overpriced buckets of popcorn. A fun movie to kick off the summer season. Hulk and The Dark Knight have a lot to live up to here.

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Positive Reviews are Rolling in for Iron Man

The reviews are starting to come in for Iron Man. So far they look great, beyond what I’d hoped and expected. It’s looking very promising, I can’t wait to see this movie. Here is a list of the reviews I’ve found so far:

Iron Man Review: Joe Tirella – Newsarama.com : “Favreau … has managed to turn in one of the most memorable film adaptations of a comic book hero that Hollywood has ever made…”

Downey Flies High in Iron Man: Kirk Honeycutt – Reuters: “Iron Man … may be the cinema superhero for the rest of us.”

Iron Man Rocks: Roger Friedman – Fox News

Iron Man a Blockbuster with a Brain: Christy Lemire – San Francisco Chronicle

Review: Iron Man: Shaun Manning – Comic Book Resources “Favreau … has created in “Iron Man” a successful blend of indie wit and blockbuster action.”

Technorati Tags: Iron Man Jon Favearu Robert Downey Jr. Gwyneth Paltrow film Marvel Comics superhero blockbuster film reviews

Summer Comic Hero Movies

I guess its more like Spring movies since Iron Man is opening on May 2nd. I can’t put into words how excited I am about this flick. Everything and I mean everything I see and read has me confident that this movie will be true to source material, and brought to the big screen in spectacular way. Robert Downey Jr. and Jon Favreau are both building my expectations with their excitement about the project. Every screen shot and trailer I’ve seen since last year at San Diego Comic Con to now has been first rate. Its just looks like they done a great job. SO to say I’m looking forward to it is an understatement. Which is odd, because honestly Iron Man isn’t one of my favorite characters, I haven’t bought an Iron Man book in AGES. I only know what’s going on with the character right now because he’s involved heavily in the Avengers and Captain America titles that I read. This excitement however should be mistaken for unrealistic expectations. This Iron Man film, being the first in what I’m guessing will be a series of movies, suffers from need to include the origin of the character and develop him up to the Iron Man we know and love. This can make a movie suffer a bit, while we go through this big set-up. Honestly I’ll be happy when this first movie is out of the way so the next one can be made without the need for the origin tale. Because as good as this first movie will probably be I’m guessing the 2nd one will be better.

Onto another Marvel character getting a film this summer, the Hulk… I’m a huge fan of the Hulk character. But man is it tough to be a Hulk fan this year. First off the Hulk comic book to me has been terrible. I was going to write a review of the Hulk #3, but just wasn’t in the mood to be so negative. I read it a couple times to give it a fair shake. I’m not going to review it now, either. I just wish I’d read some of Jeph Loeb’s other limited series that are supposed to be brilliant first, without the taint of Ultimates 3 and the new Hulk Series in the back of my mind. Because these recent examples of his storytelling skills are less then impressive.

Getting back to movies, The Incredible Hulk specifically is concerning me. I haven’t had the same bowled over feeling viewing the trailers for this movie as I had with the Iron Man trailers.  Ed Norton’s current silence and what appears to be unhappiness with the direction of the project starts to seed some doubt as well. Plus in my mind Norton doesn’t seem like the natural choice to play Banner. I mean Downey as Tony Stark/Iron Man seemed to be a perfect fit. Christian Bale as Bruce Wayne/Batman, is brilliant.. but Ed Norton as Banner, meh I guess its okay. Of course, I’ll have to see him in the role to judge, but right off the bat it doesn’t seem as perfect a fit in my mind.

Regarding the story it sounds cool from what I’ve picked up here and there. The Abomination isn’t might first choice for a villain since it means we’re going to end up with a CGI slugfest. I’d personally think the Leader would have been an awesome choice and would provide a more interesting story… but I’m not paid to write for Hollywood so what do I know. I’d been a long advocate of the Scarecrow as a film nemesis for Batman and it turned out to produce a cool film.

There are a few other films coming such as Batman being a real obvious one, that I’m excited about of course. BUT my time is short tonight, with it being a “school night”.

New Photos for Hulk, Wolverine Movies

The new Empire magazine has a cool pic of Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark on the cover and some great new photos of Ed Norton hulking out, first photo of Gen. Thunderbolt Ross as played by William Hurt.

The also give us new photos of Hugh Jackman as Wolverine, which is cool and all… not as cool as the Hulk sneak peeks. Come on, we’ve seen Jackman as Wolverine in three X-Men movies already how amped are we supposed to get for those photos?

Slashfilm has all the photos grouped on one page.

Technorati Tags:Marvel superheroes Wolverine Hugh Jackman Iron Man Robert Downey Jr. William Hurt Ed Norton Hulk X-Men

Jon Favreau, man don’t let me down

Everytime I see stills from the upcoming Iron Man film I get pumped up for this movie. I was totally geeking out at San Diego Comicon when we got to see footage from the film. As good as it all looks I so afraid that for some reason something will go wrong and the story will suck or something like that. I’m hoping beyond hope that this is unfounded worrying. After the steaming pile of crap that was the Hulk movie, it’s hard not to be a little gun shy when a new film comes out based on a Marvel property.

Marvel Digital Comics Unlimited is Now Online

Marvel has started its digital comic book subscription service. Where for $9.99 a month (or $4.99 if you pay for a year up front) you have access to a constantly updating archive of Marvel comics dating back as far as the World War II era. An archive is a good word for the offerings in this service since comic books from this year are few and far between. Its hard to fault them for doing this since they don’t want to cut into their print books revenue. Having access to the first Spider-man story, old Fantastic Four and WWII Capt. America stories is still pretty cool. Current series are on this service as well, usually up to their 2006 issues. All comics are presented ad-free, which is cool.

I played with the interface on some of the sample content that is offered for free. It is pretty smooth to navigate through the pages. This really comes as no surprise since Marvel has long been experimenting with online comic book presentation. They’ve found a formula that works. I’ve long been a fan of the CD-ROM collected series, but I can still see the value of this service. Its a great way to get caught up on a series that you came into late or for historical purposes for those curious about their favorite characters earlier adventures.

Of course I’m greedy, I’d like to be able to download e-comics and own them… but this payment structure no different from the subscription based music services… of which I don’t care for either. I’m still of a mentality where I like to own things out right. If you don’t have that kind of hang up and enjoy reading comic book back issues. This isn’t a bad deal, hopefully some of the other publishers will follow suite.

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I’m a Marvel … and I’m a DC, After Hours

This was originally a Mac/PC commercial satire using action figures from both of the major comic publishers, but it has spawned an “After Hours” series as well at the bar where both sets of heroes hang out and talk about their various movie projects, both successes and failures. There are about 6 of these in the series I believe. It really helps to know the characters and about the movie franchises to get some of the humor, but I’m guessing if you’re reading this blog that ain’t a problem.

Iron Man Trailer debuting September 10th

According to the SCI FI Wire the Iron Man trailer will be airing on Viacom owned networks. One airing being before ‘The Hills’ on MTV. This will be followed up with a hi-def download of the trailer being made available on Apple.com on Tuesday Sept. 11th.

Very cool news! I can finally stop trying to describe this trailer to people. I was among the lucky ones who saw the Iron Man trailer at San Diego Comic-con this summer. My first order of business Tuesday will be downloading this .mov file. Woot!

Source: Iron Man Teaser Due Next Week – SCI FI Wire

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